


The Long Way Down

by liluye (mouselini)



Category: Dragon Age II
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Post-All That Remains, Rivalmance, Tacky sad fluff, brief violence and suicidal thoughts soooo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-29
Updated: 2015-05-29
Packaged: 2018-04-01 18:29:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,129
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4030162
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mouselini/pseuds/liluye
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Generic "All That Remains"-inspired ficlet in which Hawke has a panic attack and Fenris gives him wine.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Long Way Down

**Author's Note:**

> This is basically a vessel for all of my crazy headcannons. Angst, ahoy.

-

Hawke isn't startled by the intrusion. There's a flicker on the wall as the candlelight catches the door-- its shadows make the ceiling look like the desert, or maybe a web, and in the corner Hawke can see the crooked legs of a spider as she sits in wait of her prey.

It's raining outside. His vision slides in and out of focus as he watches a fly circle the light on the wall; it lands near the imaginary web but it doesn't matter because it snaps in two when Fenris closes the door. The sound makes the spider disappear too, so Hawke lifts his hand to a nearby candle and tries to bring her back by curling his fingers like Malcolm would do on the side of their moonlit tent every Summer. The shadow puppet's too big for comfort and the flame that licks his palm feels cold. He's quick to give up when the wall turns black.

He drags his eyes up to the armor clinging to Fenris's chest and lets his welling gaze linger at the fabric, damp and dark, still knotted around his wrist. In the dim light Hawke swears he sees it trickle across Fenris's gauntlet and down the length of the bottle in his fists. The air between them turns sour when the wine is offered -- Hawke stares in terror at his family's bleeding coat of arms as his fingers accept the bottle and bring it up to his mouth.

"I don't know what to say, but I'm here." Fenris's voice sounds strange. It's so low that it rattles the window like the rain, hurts Hawke's head, contorts his chest in a way that makes him want to puke.

"Y--" he chokes then, catching stray droplets of wine with the sleeves of his robe. The bottle rolls to the floor when it's empty.

"Hawke?"

"Is it my fault?"

Fenris pauses and glances down at his feet. "No. Hawke, none of this is your f--"

"Stop lying to me," the knot in his throat snaps and Hawke is disgusted by the wine between his teeth. "Stop lying -- "

" _I'm not the one who can forgive you._ "

There's a threatening stillness then, the kind that churns between lightning and thunder, and Hawke can feel the winds change as he drops his head into his hands. The fire crackles in the chimney but the room grows colder with every raindrop that hits the window.

"Hawke."

Silence. 

"Garrett."

Hawke hears his mother in the way Fenris says his name. They both soften the 'a', sigh it the way they'd sigh "gasp" or "gather". Baby Bethany used to say it like that too. It was the first thing she ever said, and the last thing he heard before she leapt in front of everyone with her hand-me-down staff pointed stupidly between the eyes of an ogre. Even the dog had grown quiet enough to hear the untenable softness of his name as it flickered to the ground to break her fall.

_This is your fault! How could you let her run off like that?!_

The room fills with the distant sound of a storm at sea, and it isn't until Fenris sinks onto the bed next to him that Hawke realizes he's shaking. He covers his face with his hands but the metallic bitterness of his bloodline clings like hell to his callouses, so he rips himself away from Fenris's reaching fingers, away from his fucking bed and darts toward the balcony where he swears he can hear his mother singing in the wind.

He meets the iron railing with determined force and squints down at Hightown, drips his vision through the cracks in the cobblestones as he tries to piece together the steps she usually takes on her way home from the market. He could hear her shoes and the sloppy patter of the dog leaping through puddles behind her, but it's only elves, two miserable elves (or were they children?) huddled together beneath a soaked blanket running in panic toward the alienage.

For the first time in his life, Hawke feels alone. Totally fucking alone. He tries to laugh but it wrenches out of him in a whimper, choked and cluttered with rainwater, and his knuckles are bleeding but he isn't sure why. The balcony door slams shut somewhere behind him and his hair drips hard into his eyes when he leans forward.

It's nice, leaning forward like that. He likes the warmth of blood rushing up to his head. He likes the way the raindrops pool in his ears until he feels muddled and deaf, he likes the hawk's-eye view and how close he can make himself to the stones far below his window. Mother used to have a fit when she'd catch him up there. She'd beg him to get away from the ledge and hit him with a broom whenever he'd pretend to lose his balance. A mirthless, empty smile curls at the corner of his mouth as he reminds himself that mother is no longer there to scold him. That she wouldn't beg him to get away from the ledge anymore. That she would be none the wiser if he stopped pretending and finally allowed himself to fall off.

The thought sends a rush of adrenaline through Hawke's spine and with a halted breath he lets go of the railing and slowly tilts over the side. "Garrett," he can almost see little bubbly Bethany waving her new staff around like a whacking stick, _"aww, you mean it's mine?"_

_"Of course not. I just spent two hours wrapping it up all nice so you couldn't look at it anymore."_

_She throws her scrawny, freckled arms around his torso and laughs wildly. The staff crashes to the floor with frightening force, and a piece of the intricately carved wooden grip flies across the courtyard and gets lost in the dog's favorite flower bed. Hawke rolls his eyes and makes a scene of peeling his little sister off of him like an old bandage, but he can't stop the grin that fights its way through the grimace he tries so hard to perfect. She punches his arm and picks up her new staff, hugging it close to her body while running her thumb across the new dent in the wood._

_Hawke fishes out the missing chunk of grip and frowns as his dog tries to tug it out of his hand. "Down, buddy! Andraste's pale white asscheeks!" He quickly tosses the piece to Bethany and hoists his massive, squiggling Mabari over his shoulders; the dog huffs and puffs before going limp in noisy defeat. "Ahh quit whining. I'm so glad my favorite staff is going to fall apart in a week."_

_Leandra cups the Mabari's face and sarcastically pouts at him while she cleans some mud off his snout, then brushes the dirt from her eldest son's arms with the same mocking expression. "Don't say that, darling. I'm sure your sister will take good care of it."_

_"Yes, mother. And you can properly cook a pumpkin and I've never had my dick sucked in my life."_

_"GARRETT SHAME ON YOU!"_

_Hawke lets his dog jump down and cackles as Leandra whacks him on the shoulder._

Within seconds Hawke shoots across the patio and hits the door with enough velocity to crack the glass. He winces up at the lithe, glowing frame of his furious elf, who's hovering over him with quaking fingers crooked and reaching for the collar of his robe.

Fenris always had a surprising amount of strength when his tattoos lit up like that. Dizzy and drunk, Hawke doesn't fully comprehend how hard Fenris throws him back into his bedroom until he wipes his nose and sees a splatter of fresh blood on his palm. Hawke sits there on the hard wood floor, staring down at his hand while Fenris screams until his voice is raw.

The last ember in the fireplace burns out and the room instantly fills with smoke, and when Fenris angrily tugs him to his feet Hawke curls his fingers at his tunic and pulls him in until he's sucking a shudder off of his bottom lip.

Fenris stills like a freezing stream, but Hawke reaches for water until his resolve shatters in a sigh that sounds like "gash". He opens his mouth, lets Fenris growl into him, lets him lick hungrily at his tongue and tremble in the confines of his arms just like he did on that first night.

"I don't need you here," he growls against Fenris's shoulder when they break apart and rakes the wet from his eyes with his fingernails. The elf presses into him harder, kisses him in a fury, wraps a shielded hand around his jaw -- it's the touch, more than the metal, that cuts through his skin. "I don't fucking need you here-- f-fuck off--"

He swears to the Maker he doesn't need Fenris there at all, but his hands keep grappling for the lyrium etched into the angles beneath his touch and he knows that Fenris understands because his armor is already halfway off.

"Don't," Hawke shudders, eyes burning with salt as they watch Fenris pull his chest piece over his head, "please don't. I can't take it, I --"

He's chasing the light beneath his fingers as it runs down the elf's neck. Fenris quiets him with a long, sad gaze, shakes his head and stops Hawke's hands before they dip past the worn fabric of his collar. "Would you like me to leave?" he asks, voice rough and red as rocks, but the question disappears when Hawke crashes down onto his bed and gasps into his pillow.

The silence that follows is thick and anxious, ringing with echoes of children's laughter and shadow puppets and charred pumpkins. Somewhere downstairs the dog is whining. For a second Hawke hears his mother open her bedroom door to let him in, but the ghosts in the house begin to frighten him and he wills himself to stop listening. Fenris's head dips between his shoulder blades; he can feel his strange heat through his robe.

"When Bee was--" he coughs into his sleeve, "when Bee was a little baby, less than a year old I think, she sneezed or yawned or something and froze her whole blanket. The whole fucking thing.

"Malcolm wasn't around, and the... The look on mother's face was... You wouldn't... She handed Bethany to me and-- I -- heh, I-I, uh--" another wet cough curls through the space between his ribs and stains his throat on its way out. "I defrosted her blanket with a heating s-sp..."

Hawke's fingers work together like they're weaving silk brocade, braiding the air in patterns that mimic all too familiar tattoos or maybe the curve of his mother's smiling eyes. He forces a sharp laugh. "I thought for sure Carver would set the crib on fire one day. Maker's balls, I was ready for it but it didn't happen. Poor f-fucking Carver grew up with his head buried in his pillows."

Fenris is so motionless, so still behind him that Hawke almost forgets he's there until he feels the soft pressure of nails digging into his skin. "I'm a mage," he whispers, and then he laughs again, begins to hyperventilate, wipes a quaking fist over his face as the elf's grip becomes protective, "I gave my little sister every staff she had, Fenris. Every last fucking one. My _dad_ taught me how to-- how'ta--"

Fenris is on top of him then, spreading his lips open with his tongue and catching his hysterical, ragged breaths between his teeth. He kisses Hawke like he's drowning, weaving his fingers through his damp hair and swallowing the quiet sobs that slowly begin to build beneath his ribs. He pulls away just to melt right back into him and Hawke can feel himself break apart around the warmth of Fenris's tongue.

" _I love you_." It comes as a whisper and Hawke almost doesn't hear it because Fenris's hands are snapping his head to the side. "I fight for you, I breathe for you, and--"

"Stop lying to me, Fenris. Tomorrow morning you'll leave." Hawke begins to laugh, sad. "Say it. Just say it, tomorrow you'll leave me, Fenris."

Fenris's breath flutters as careful as the fingertips he splays across Hawke's collarbone. He gathers him against his chest, brings an apogetic hand up to his hair and slowly nods. "Tomorrow morning I will leave you."

The admission is strangely comforting, and when his tears come and go, when Fenris falls asleep with his forehead pressed against his temple, Hawke hears the rain as it turns to snow, white and wilting like lily petals against the clouding panes of his bedroom window.


End file.
